“The Visualizer:” GEOG PhD Student Translates Complex Water Data into Maps

Cortney Gustafson doesn’t need someone to draw her a picture to demonstrate that the world’s most important resource—water—is in danger of, well, drying up. But the Geographical Sciences doctoral student had an opportunity to illustrate the severity of the issue for others when she contributed to a project led by the World Bank about the effect of climate change on fresh water sources around the world.

In a comprehensive report released earlier this year entitled “High and Dry: Climate Change, Water and the Economy,” the World Bank warns that economies across large portions of the globe are in jeopardy of shrinking by 2050 as climate change causes fresh water sources to become scarce.

A team of researchers and graduate students from the University of Maryland provided background research and support for the project. Gustafson in particular was asked by a faculty mentor, Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm from the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, to take large data sets and turn them into maps and other charts using a software system called ArcGIS (see example below).

“I’m sort of the visualizer. I’m the person who takes the excel spreadsheet with all these numbers that really won’t mean anything to anyone at first glance and I put that into images that may say a little bit more and make it more obvious,” Gustafson said.

Gustafson said she was excited by the prospect of working on the World Bank project because it falls in line with her personal research and mission to find better ways to manage water.

“To me, (water) is a resource as valuable as money, if not more so. I personally think we should budget our water sources like we budget our bank accounts,” Gustafson said. “It’s a large resource but it’s not an unlimited resource and with time and population growth, that resource will become hard to tap.”

The World Bank report stresses Gustafson’s sentiment, projecting that “reduced freshwater availability and competition from other uses—such as energy and agriculture—could reduce water availability in cities by as much as two thirds by 2050, compared to 2015 levels.” The report urges for the development of climate change and water policies that will help turn the tide on the world’s water problems before they research crisis levels.

Gustafson, who plans to work on developing models for sustainable water policies after completing her PhD, hopes the message from the World Bank will create conversations that lead to action.

“We need to start thinking about changes that need to be made and to get people motivated, hopefully not through fear but through education,” Gustafson said. “Now we’re realizing it is serious, it is extreme and there’s data to back it up.”

Other UMD contributors to the World Bank report included: Raul Muñoz-Castillo, a graduate student in the Department of Geographical Sciences; Leon Clark, research professor in the School of Public Policy; Mohama Hejazi, visiting assistant research scientist with the Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center; Son Kim with the Joint Global Change Research Institute (JGCRI); Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm, Professor of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences.

Published on Thu, Sep 15, 2016 - 1:40PM